A Peer's Message of Thanks

Most of our readers are very familiar with the story of Kaylon Holt, a young peer at Perry Wellness Center who has taken on a massive project on behalf of charity. His goal is to collect 1,000,000 redeemable pop tops for donation to the Ronald McDonald House in Columbus, Georgia. This organization provides lodging and other assistance to families of hospitalized, seriously ill children.

Recently, Kaylon sat down to write his own “thank you” to regional media outlets and, through them, all the individuals and organizations who have helped him so far with his mission. We thought that we’d share this message with our readers, as you have followed his story and, in many cases, contributed to the cause.

TO ALL MEDIA IN SUMTER, SCHLEY, AND MARION COUNTIES

Area newspapers and other media have been wonderful to print and share my progress in the collection of pop tops to help Ronald McDonald House of Columbus. To date, I have delivered 630,000 tops to Columbus Ronald McDonald. We already have over 28,000 for our next delivery. I was told that we helped pay the total utility bill for the YEAR at their site on 1959 Hamilton Road, Columbus.

Each time I visit with Mr. [Mulkey] McMichael, my reception has been great. I look forward to each visit and the reception I receive.

I began my pop top collection about 13 months ago. My goal is to be the top individual pop top collector in the shortest amount of time. I want to collect over 1 million by mid-2016. With your continued good help in Marion, Schley, and Sumter Counties, I will meet my goal!

-- Kaylon Holt, peer at Perry Wellness Center of Americus, Georgia

By the way, mark your calendar for January 26 – Kaylon and Stuart Perry will be making an appearance on Cordele TV-51 (time to be announced).

In the above photo, Kaylon displays recent certificates of appreciation he has received from the Ronald McDonald House.